Stanley Donwood was working as a freelance artist in Plymouth in 1994 when he received a surprise call from former classmate, Thom Yorke. Radiohead, the Oxford-based five-piece that Yorke fronted, had released their debut LP, Pablo Honey, a year prior, spawning a massive hit in the form of their debut single, Creep.

The duo had met while studying fine art and English literature at Exeter University in the late 1980s, and would frequently venture from the drab environs of the fine art building to the hallowed grounds of the graphic design department, whose tech exceeded what was available to them elsewhere.

“There were no computers available for the art students,” Donwood recalls. “You had to pretend that you were working on a project involving graphic design and then you could cross through the doors into this area where, instead of scuffed-up lino on the floor, you had that industrial cord carpet that was popular in offices. I think they were trying to prepare the graphic design students for a life of digital drudgery.”

Yorke’s first impressions of Donwood were based on appearances alone. In Yorke’s opinion, Donwood’s hat and suit were better than his own. “That pissed me off,” he jests in the foreword to Donwood’s book, There Will Be No Quiet. “I figured I’d either end up really not liking this person at all or working with him for the rest of my life.”